Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

National Public Radio: Choosing Sides and Controlling the Terms Of the Debate With Our Money
Townhall.com ^ | July 6, 2010 | Ken Blackwell

Posted on 07/06/2010 6:23:45 AM PDT by Kaslin

Pro-lifers have long understood the issue of media bias. Years ago, the late, pro-choice David Shaw wrote a series of articles in the Los Angeles Times showing how biased his own newspaper was when reporting on abortion. Shaw showed that bias came through not just on stories about abortion. Shaw showed how even stories that related to surgery on unborn children were skewed or spiked to avoid anything that might have a pro-life message.

Now, we have National Public Radio (NPR) lining up to support the pro-abortion side in the ongoing struggle over this issue. Managing Editor David Sweeney recently issued a memorandum to staff ordering them to use only the politically correct designations for the contending sides in the debate: abortion rights advocates is the approved way of referring to those who favor liberalized abortion; abortion rights opponents is the only way NPR will refer, from now on, to pro-lifers.

This should not come as any great shock to us. NPR has long been hostile to conservatives and traditional values. The part I object to most strenuously, that I think we should all object to, is that NPR takes public tax money to spread its pro-abortion bias.

You are more likely to hear about transvestites in Mongolia on “All Things Considered” than to learn about the 3,000-plus Pregnancy Resources Centers created and staffed by American volunteers. “Fresh Air” would be more likely to cover a hole in the ozone layer than to report on California’s underground reporter Lila Rose. Lila Rose’s brave and truthful reporting blew the cover off Planned Parenthood’s racist practices and disclosed how that world trafficker in abortion ignores laws on statutory rape.

There is little pro-lifers can do to stop the relentless pro-abortion bias of the New York Times. We can take some grim satisfaction in the fact that the Gray Lady is now in serious decline. The late Richard Neuhaus used to tease the Times by calling it “our parish newspaper.” He exposed its fundamental dishonesty over long decades. Newsweek, another liberal mainstay that sneers at pro-lifers, is now on the auction bloc.

If you are pro-choice and doubt my charge of bias and you dismiss the proof provided by pro-choice reporter, David Shaw, I ask you to take this challenge: Is there any group other than NPR, the New York Times, Newsweek, and the rest of the liberal claque, that does not get to decide what it calls itself?

Think of the old Soviet Union. It was never a Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, although it called itself that. As soon as the Berlin Wall came down, most of those “republics” made a break for freedom. Hezbollah—the Lebanon-based terrorist outfit funded by Iran—has a name that translates “Party of God.” Do even liberal reporters and editors think Hezbollah’s activities are godly? Let Chastity Bono, the daughter of Sonny and Cher Bono, go through surgery and hormone treatments and is there a liberal publication on the planet that will not call this person Chaz and refer to this person as a man?

Pro-lifers alone are denied the right to be called what we call ourselves. Maybe it’s because liberal scribes see the power in the pro-life designation. Maybe it’s because they know that the truth can make people free.

Pro-lifers are not just against liberalized abortion. We object to elder-killing—what they call euphemistically, physician-assisted suicide. We protest cloning humans. So, according to Gallup, do 88% of Americans. We are against killing unborn embryonic humans to obtain their stem cells.

“Pro-life” puts our various “antis” into one neat, descriptive, and truthful phrase. Maybe NPR is doing us a favor, however. The president of the conservative Heritage Foundation described his first visit to Moscow after the Iron Curtain came down. He was accosted by an elderly Russian woman who thanked him profusely for all he had done for freedom.

“How did you know what we did for freedom?” he asked, noting that under Communism, the press was rigidly controlled. “Whenever they mentioned Heritage Foundation,” the grandmotherly Russian said, “they told us how bad you were. That’s how we knew you were good!”

So go ahead, NPR, continue your obvious and shameless bias. And the next time we have a Congress that listens, let’s demand that NPR do it on your own dime. Let NPR line up with the Times and Newsweek and see if you sink or swim.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: abortion; allthingsconsidered; defundpbsnpr; defundtheleft; dnctalkingpoints; npr; pravdamedia; publicradio

1 posted on 07/06/2010 6:23:50 AM PDT by Kaslin
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

NPR is on a par with USPS.


2 posted on 07/06/2010 6:25:50 AM PDT by Recon Dad ( Don't sweat the petty things and don't pet the sweaty things)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Defund the Propaganda Broadcast System and National Propaganda Radio.


3 posted on 07/06/2010 6:26:09 AM PDT by Ghost of Philip Marlowe (Prepare for survival.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Bookmark to print later for my pro-life NPR friend. Go figure.


4 posted on 07/06/2010 6:27:18 AM PDT by arkady_renko
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Ghost of Philip Marlowe

It needs to be defunded right now


5 posted on 07/06/2010 6:28:40 AM PDT by Kaslin (Acronym for OBAMA: One Big Ass Mistake America)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
It needs to be defunded right now

it needed to be defunded during the Reagan and Bush 1 and 2 admins...if it didnt happen then, it sure as heck aint gonna happen with zer0bambam in office and both houses run by Pelousey and Dingy Harry.....

6 posted on 07/06/2010 6:32:05 AM PDT by Vaquero (Don't pick a fight with an old guy. If he is too old to fight, he'll just kill you.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Vaquero
They are like a cult unto themselves, just try to interact with them, you'll never feel so much like an unwashed rabble trying to get some Queen Antoinette Cake to eat.
7 posted on 07/06/2010 6:34:56 AM PDT by norraad ("What light!">Blues Brothers)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
You are more likely to hear about transvestites in Mongolia on “All Things Considered” than to learn about the 3,000-plus Pregnancy Resources Centers created and staffed by American volunteers.

Long, long ago, Penn State University's student/NPR station had a local show called "A View From The Left." Since the stories were indistinguishable from "All Things Considered," we used to lump them together as "All Views From The Left Considered."

8 posted on 07/06/2010 6:36:57 AM PDT by Gondring (Paul Revere would have been flamed as a naysayer troll and told to go back to Boston.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

It still infuriates me that this man ran for Governor of Ohio in 2006 and not one word was said suggesting racism was involved in keeping him out.

Yet in 2008 when HIllary Clinton beat Obama for the Dem primary, the Media went nuts saying the state was racist.

Blackwell is one of the most under utilized assets in the Republican party. He is much stronger than Steele.


9 posted on 07/06/2010 6:40:23 AM PDT by lonestar67 ("I love my country a lot more than I love politics," President George W. Bush)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

I’ve yet to hear the word “Pro-life” spoken at NPR. It’s always “Anti-abortionists” instead.


10 posted on 07/06/2010 6:40:23 AM PDT by Huskrrrr
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
let’s demand that NPR do it on your own dime.

Not only should they switch to really be "listener supported whatever", but should have to repay all the tax money paid to them over the years for their biased reporting during that time.

11 posted on 07/06/2010 6:47:48 AM PDT by C210N (0bama, Making the world safe for Marxism)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

I was watching a PBS channel last night and couldn’t beleive all the leftist garbage. KLCS THE EDUCATION STATION. “KLCS-TV/DT has come a long way since it first hit the airwaves in November of 1973, as a noncommercial educational station licensed to the Los Angeles Unified School District. As a member of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), and currently the fifth most watched PBS station in the country...” PROGRAMS A-Z INCLUDES Democracy Now! (A daily “news” program.)
http://tinyurl.com/2bam7pf
WTH??


12 posted on 07/06/2010 6:55:24 AM PDT by anglian
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

The Left must be defunded at every opportunity. I hold Republicans responsible for allowing NPR to be funded when they were in control of Congress. I hope they have learned their lesson.


13 posted on 07/06/2010 7:05:51 AM PDT by theBuckwheat
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Government isn’t as big a source of NPR funding as most here seem to think.

. For FY08, the most recent data available, the average station’s revenues came from the following sources:

* 32.1% from listeners in the form of pledges, memberships, and other donations
* 21.1% from businesses via corporate underwriting
* 10.1% from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which is federally funded*
* 13.6% from licensee support (including colleges and universities)
* 9.6% from foundations and major gifts
* 5.8% from federal, state, and local governments
* 7.6% from all other sources.

http://www.npr.org/about/privatesupport.html


14 posted on 07/06/2010 7:26:39 AM PDT by tlb
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

I find it interesting that the pro-abortion journalist who did an honest piece about media bias on the issue works(ed?) for the LA Times. This seems to be another example of something I’ve noticed many times before, that unlike most other major America dailies, actual objective journalism still seems to be alive at the LA Times, despite the leftist views of the newsroom and editorial board.


15 posted on 07/06/2010 8:06:03 AM PDT by The_Reader_David (And when they behead your own people in the wars which are to come, then you will know. . .)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Defund NPR and the whole Corporation for Public Broadcasting. We cannot afford these things any longer.


16 posted on 07/06/2010 8:31:06 AM PDT by CPT Clay (Pick up your weapon and follow me.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: tlb
Government isn’t as big a source of NPR funding as most here seem to think.

That's because the federal largesse is hidden in other items. Much of that college and university support is based on government funds.

If there were any way to check it, I could offer a wager that their individual contributor base (listeners) has a very small private enterprise footprint. Government jobs, so government funding once removed.

Probably to be more accurate, one could say that NPR is funded by leftists who specialize in using other people's money. That would sweep up most of that 21.1% that comes from corporations, for instance.

17 posted on 07/06/2010 11:07:53 AM PDT by thulldud (Is it "alter or abolish" time yet?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin; Timesink; martin_fierro; reformed_democrat; Loyalist; =Intervention=; PianoMan; GOPJ; ...
Media Schadenfreude and Media Shenanigans PING

Now, we have National Public Radio (NPR) lining up to support the pro-abortion side in the ongoing struggle over this issue. Managing Editor David Sweeney recently issued a memorandum to staff ordering them to use only the politically correct designations for the contending sides in the debate: abortion rights advocates is the approved way of referring to those who favor liberalized abortion; abortion rights opponents is the only way NPR will refer, from now on, to pro-lifers.

18 posted on 07/06/2010 12:41:44 PM PDT by a fool in paradise (I wish our president loved the US military as much as he loves Paul McCartney.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson